Detectives: Thoughts, ideas, balance, Holmes.

[Broseidon, of the Brocean]

We're making 1 player innocent, not half the server. His role as the bastion of innocence creates even more tension and paranoia. Who's out to help the detective and who's just pretending so they can get closer? Maybe an innocent leading the detective to a body is actually a traitor leading the detective into a trap. You're obviously terrible at this kind of thing so I'd probably just stop typing if I were you.

I like the game the way it is, therefore I'm terrible at it, and therefore I should not offer input that differs from what's already been said? Wow... not only was that a personal attack that completely uncalled for, it's pretty flawed logic and says more about you than about me. More like you're butt-hurt about someone disagreeing with your idea, and instead of coming up with a valid counter-argument, you try to neutralize his credibility by making an assumption (completely unrelated) about... his computer playing skills.

I know that you only wanted there to be 1 or 2 detectives. I knew that when I wrote the post. So I still stand by what I said. Having a bastion of innocence doesn't add more tension and paranoia, it adds a beacon of certainty that this game has been lacking - which was a huge part of what made it unique. Killing traitors and getting tested prove innocence, of course, but there are always those players who weren't around to see you get tested, or didn't see you kill a traitor and weren't convinced just by seeing the "inspected" message. And if they accuse you, you'll have to wonder if it's because they're traitors or if they were just totally out of it the whole round. If there's one player who gets to be an unquestionable beacon of integrity, the creepiness is gone and all innocents will be expected to take his side, even if he's shooting other innocents.

Additionally, having a designated detective player will even further encourage "dead-beat" gameplay. There will be many rounds in which the whole server is following around the detective everywhere he goes, whether he likes it or not, and so the round just keeps dragging on and goes nowhere because nobody will want to leave the big crowd (and if a traitor leaves to go snipe or plant a C4, you'll immediately know why that guy is leaving). You wont be able to live out your fantasy of luring away the detective and tricking him into checking a corpse so you can shoot him (which I do to innocents all the time). Everyone will follow him, wherever he gets lured, and whatever happens to him will be known right away. The whole game will CENTER on the detective.

Also, if you've played TTT lately, you might notice that the ratio of innocent wins to traitor wins these days is around 4:1. The question is, do you really think this is a time where it should be made even easier for the innocents? I challenge you to answer that without using more childish insults.

[Killroy]

Basically, the detective will simply be someone you know you can trust - just like the traitor checkers on Borders, TheThing and District. I don't see anyone complaining about those.

[Marphy Black]

Basically, the detective will simply be someone you know you can trust - just like the traitor checkers on Borders, TheThing and District. I don't see anyone complaining about those.

This will merely add to the number of confirmed innocents without even requiring the formality of said tests.

Also, traitor checkers aren't reliable. I'm certainly not going to trust a traitor check that I didn't personally witness, yet I'm definitely not going to stick around one of those traitor check buildings if three quarters of the server decides to cram themselves in there to watch. Hence, there's still plenty of paranoia to go around when only the few present during the actual check can trust the results. A detective clearly marked in the scoreboard entirely nullifies that.

[Killroy]

Mm, fair point.

...We could give the detective a big icon over his head for traitors only, maybe? Make him all the easier to kill and maybe removing the chances of all the possible shit happening.

I'm just pulling ideas from my ass, mind.

[Bad King Urgrain]

At this stage I'm more interested in ideas and concepts for detective equipment than in arguments about how detectives are going to ruin the game. I plan to find out if they do by trying it out.

So, regarding a couple of equipment ideas:
- Fingerprint checking (on all weapons/items): yes. Not sure yet in what form, probably a "weapon" that has a short range (larger than pickup range) and checks what you target.

- List of all people you've seen: no. Too much data.

- Weapon cross referencing: not sure. Seems like it makes fingerprint checking pretty useless for almost all cases, if you can look at everyone's gun and know who killed someone.

- Bomb disarm kit: can't hurt, have the CS:S model so might as well use it. If a detective happens to have a credit and sees a bomb, he can buy it.

- Beacons that show a location on everyone's HUD: maybe. Perhaps detectives should get one for free.

- Healing: maybe. I've considered a health "station" with limited charge that detectives would drop somewhere (and then perhaps drop a beacon), which could then be used by anyone who goes there (including traitors) until it runs out.

- Freeze ray for freezing people for a few seconds: interesting. It's certainly a cop-like weapon.

- Will for passing on equipment on death: nah. Haven't decided yet whether detectives should be able to drop special weapons for innocents to pick up and use.


Of the existing equipment, the radar seems like it could also be useful for detectives. Teleporter as well.

[Killroy]

Perhaps the detective could get a bulletproof vest, too. Possibly even with a helmet.

[UnInvincible]

Also, if you've played TTT lately, you might notice that the ratio of innocent wins to traitor wins these days is around 4:1. The question is, do you really think this is a time where it should be made even easier for the innocents? I challenge you to answer that without using more childish insults.

What?
Last time I played TTT I won every round as traitor, and I believe the traitor traitor team won the majority of the time.

Perhaps the detective could get a bulletproof vest, too. Possibly even with a helmet.

I don't think so, the detective is supposed to be a player that has the ability to figure out who the traitors are foil the traitors plans. If they're able to have items that help only themselves it kind of ignores the point of the detective.

[Ajunk]

garble barble knarble

I chose an extremely light ad hominem approach (which you blew out of proportion, hilariously) because I know there's really no tactile way of convincing you this will not break the game. By the way, making things easier for the traitor's isn't just easy, it's fun.

Anyways, detective item idea: Body detector. You have to be holding it for it to work, and it starts beeping if you're within a certain radius of an unidentified body. Closer you get, the more it beeps.

[UnInvincible]

Anyways, detective item idea: Body detector. You have to be holding it for it to work, and it starts beeping if you're within a certain radius of an unidentified body. Closer you get, the more it beeps.

Sounds pretty ballin' to me.

[Ajunk]

Detective item idea: Footstep finder. When this item is out, you can see all the footsteps of where people have walked, which perhaps fade with time. I realize there's probably many source restrictions that stop this from being done word-for-word, but the general idea I think is good.

[worbat]

Detective item idea: Footstep finder. When this item is out, you can see all the footsteps of where people have walked, which perhaps fade with time. I realize there's probably many source restrictions that stop this from being done word-for-word, but the general idea I think is good.

How about each person is assigned a colour, and that colour appears as a floating trail behind them.

[Ajunk]

The problem with that is what you can simply see a blue trail at the crime scene, and instead of following it, just shoot whoever you see that has a blue trail behind them.

Although a trail is the much easier version of actual footstep textures on the ground. With a little more work, you could even get a trail of footsteps icons (like gmod's lolololololololol trail).

[Bad King Urgrain]

I would like a thing where if you buy it (or perhaps even wield it) every step a player takes draws a luminescent footstep (fading out with time). I just have some doubts about feasibility from a technical point of view. Will do some testing, because if it's possible it would be a very detective thing to have.

[Blan21]

new detective weapon ideas:

name: "Tranquilizer gun"

model: crossbow

description: similar the the spy's version in team fortress classic, slows the person down. However in this one it would also make their view crazy in some way, making it difficult to aim.

main uses: If you strongly suspect someone and want to check them out, shoot them with this so you can catch up to them and make sure they don't headshot you

details: people who are under this effect turn green in color entirely (their model) and it lasts for 30 seconds. The gun has 5-7 rounds that take 5 seconds to shoot between each one. They do NO DAMAGE.


Other idea for crossbow:

name: "Disarmer"

model: crossbow

description: a gun that instantly makes the person drop their primary, secondary, and grenade.

main uses: If you suspect someone and want to see all their weapons, or check ammo. If you see a traitor shooting someone just take one shot and all they have is their crowbar, magneto stick, and possibly their traitor euquipment if it applies. If you suspect someone, use this to take them all away from him (if you have an empty inventory).

details: The dropped weapons cannot be picked up by the person who dropped them for 2-3 seconds. The gun holds 7 rounds and does no damage. Not very useful on a person weilding a traitor weapon such as a silenced pistol, flare gun, or knife. People who get hit by this turn a certain color while they cannot pick up their weapons.


you could combine these too, or tweak them however you like. Just some ideas for your consideration BKU.

[Killroy]

Can you set it so that if your karma is below a certain point, you can't become a Detective? It would honestly probably lower cases of dick detectives.

[Bad King Urgrain]

Have you seen dick detectives with low karma? If yes, how low was it?

A lower cutoff is possible, more so than making detective chances directly related to karma (which will cause people to throw an even bigger hissy fit over losing 10 karma points even if they still have >900). For now I'll make it a lower probability of being selected (same as if you were detective the previous round) if your karma is below 600.

[Killroy]

Sounds cool. Always good to minimize chances of dickery.

[Derp]

I'd like to see the Detective getting a sort of first-aid kit.

Single use, gives the person it's used on full health, and he can use it on anyone other than himself.

Seems like it would have some uses, but not tip the balance of the game too badly.

It'd also be cool if he could get a special pistol. Maybe something with a three-round burst? (Honestly I'd like to see that just applied to the pistol in general, I may be wrong but it seems woefully underpowered.)

[zoobird]

I don't really like the idea of detective weapons, but I would like to see more tools used to help figure out who is a traitor.  

Hows about real detective tools?  
(I know most of these are just silly, and impossible to do or even implement.)  

-Duster or Magnify Glass: Check for finger prints on weapons to see who held it last.

-DNA Kit: Take blood from a dead body (assuming that killers always leave DNA evidence on a corpse), and compare it to one living person to see if they are the killer.  

This could be a bit overpowered so it needs some balance which could come in one or both ways:
1.  If the person tested did kill the person the sample was collected from it will come out positive, and that is regardless if the killer is a traitor or not.  So, even if the player being tested is a traitor they must have killed the person the sample came from, or the results comes out negative.
2. DNA takes about 2-3 minutes to be "processed in the lab".  

-Bionic-Ear-Listener: Aim at a player or through a wall to listen in on traitor mic chat.  If a lot of other players are chatting it causes interference and won't work.  Traitor mic chat won't come up red for you so listen well. Only works for few seconds and has to recharge.  
http://www.darkcreek.com/detective_equipment/spyear5hj.png

-Wireless Surveillance Camera: Small video camera making it hard hard to see.  With the switch of a button it can be used to see who is around a certain area for a few seconds before it has to recharge.  Can be removed and placed somewhere else, but easily destroyed as well.

-Tripwire:  Whenever a player walks over the wire an alarm sounds.  

-Lock Out Drops:  Locks a door and puts a HP counter on it.  The door can open again after the counter reaches 0.  
http://www.darkcreek.com/detective_equipment/lockout_drops.htm

-LumaLite with Spray: Lights up blood to make it easily seen on the ground or on a person.  Stab, shoot, fall, etc. blood will be on a player and, sometimes can only be seen with the lumalite tool.  After a certain period of time the blood on a person will fade away.

Alternatively the tool can instead be made for seeing footprints of blood that a player would leave after stepping near a dead body, and fade away after a period of time.  

-Body Armor: Same as a traitors, but halves the damage from a knife instead of a instant kill.  

[Ajunk]

Duster/Magnify Glass has already been suggested.

DNA kit seems overpowered.

Bionic Ear Listener discourages traitor teamwork so I think it's a step in the wrong direction.

Portable Camera has been suggested already, but I think you've weakened it too much. Simply letting you look where the camera is at any time is good enough, I think, so long as it can be noticed and destroyed.

Lockout Drops seems like a traitor weapon more than a detective item. I think it's been discussed before too, and is really hard to implement properly.

LumaLite seems like you're taking something from real life and adding it to the game instead of seeing what the game needs and matching it to something in real life. There was good talk about being able to see footprints that fade over time, but the blood and other stuff just seems so... dumb. What solid evidence or good work can you do knowing where someone has fell?

The only body armor the detectives should be using is the trust of the innocents and getting protection from them.